SHEERA

Sheera is made out of suji/rava with milk and sugar.  It is a very good dish  for breakfast as well as evening snacks.   My daughter on every Thursday, she takes the same in the tiffin box and I happily make this being the day of Krishna and Sai Baba for Prasad too.   Normally, it is made for the Satyanarayana Pooja and we all love to eat the same with bananas and lots of dry fruits in it.

MAA LADOO, CHUTNEY DAL LADOO, POTTUKADALAI LADDO

Ingredients:

1  cup chutney dal (pottukadalai, dhalia)
1  cup sugar
1/4 tsp cardamom powder
1/4  tsp dry ginger powder
handful of cashews  (break into small pieces)
ghee 1/2  cup

Method:

clean the chutney dal, remove the dust if any.
mix together the dal and sugar, cardamom powder, dry ginger powder and grind to a fine powder in the mixer.  Transfer the same to a large bowl.remove it to a large bowl.

heat one teaspoon ghee and fry the cashews and keep aside.
heat the remaining ghee in the same kadai and pour half the quantity of ghee in the  bowl.  Mix well with the sugar, chutney dal powder, cashews .  Do not pour the ghee at a time.

  take handful of mix in your hand and press hard and see whether it is binding or not.  If it is possible to bind the ladoo, the consistency is ok.  If not, then you have to add the ghee little by little.

 Make laddo out of the mixer and serve. 

Note:  too much ghee will make them soggy.  the consistency should be able to make ladoos without breaking. that much ghee only should be used.

Normally dry ginger powder is not used. I used it because any kind of dals will produce gas.  ginger powder helps in digestion.

KAMAL KAKKADI CHIPS, LOTUS STEM CHIPS

Lotus stem chips is very easy to make.  This chips is slightly sweet and i had it as it is.  If you wish you can add little bit of chaat masala, chilli powder, black pepper powder, black salt or normal salt.  can be served with rice varieties or just can be had it with over a cup of hot tea/coffee.

Lotus stem chips

Guava Cheese, Amrud cheese, Perakka cheese, Koyapazham cheese

Guavas are rich in fibre, vitamin A,B, C & E.  The vitamin C content is more in Guava than oranges.  It helps in regulating high blood pressure, cholesterol and good for diabetic people also. The leaves are boiled in water and strained and consumed for cough and cold.

KULITH RASAM, MUTHIRA RASAM, HORSEGRAM RASAM, KOLLU RASAM

Rasam is a watery dish served after having sambar rice in Southern States.  It is a good appetiser too.  Various types of rasams are made viz. tomato rasam, mysore rasam, milagu rasam etc.  recently one of my cousin visited our house.  she is also equally interested in cooking like me so she shared the recipe.


Rasam is one of the  dish we really enjoy. myself and my elder brother is very fond of it.  my mami used to make goddu rasam or kottu rasam.  we love to eat rice with this rasam and nothing else is required.

muthira rasam, kulith rasam, horsegram rasam

HORSE GRAM CURRY, MUTHIRA KOOTU

Horsegram is or kulith or muthira it is called, is  rich in B-complex vitamins,  proteine and  highly nutritious. 

It is  commonly prescribed in ayurvedic medicine for conditions like difficult breathing, cough, gastric problems, ulcers, worm infections and excessive perspiration. Some alternative medicine experts even consider horse gram as a good remedy to control joints pain. It can be also used as a natural health tonic.    It tones up the digestive system and prevents acidity and flatulence. 

People suffering from spleen enlargement, colic and weak liver can also benefit from this plants medicinal properties. People with kidney stones, hypertension, gall stones also benefit from its intake.   
Let us have a look at the recipe now

Various dishes are made out with Kulith or horsegram or muthira.  One of the dish is presented here for you.

horsegram curry

RIBBON PAKODA, PAKODA, NADA,

Normally, ribbon pakodas are made with rice flour and gram flour.  But my friend Jayashree shared some pakodas made by her and it was very crispy.  when i checked with her how she made it, she shared the recipe with me which i am sharing with you all.

BANANA FLOWER THORAN, BANANA BLOSSOM THORAN, VAZHAPOO THORAN, BANANA FLOWER STIR FRY

Banana flower thoran is made of banana flowers finely chopped, cooked and garnished with grated coconut or crushed coconut with green chilli and cumin seeds.  It is a nice side dish for sambar rice, rasam rice, dal rice, chapti etc.

banana flower subzi thoran

BANANA FLOWER SAMBAR, VAZHAPOO SAMBAR, KHEL PHOOLCHI SAMBAR

Banana flower sambar is made like the normal sambar you make.  either you can use the ground masala or sambar powder instead.  

Banana flower sambar

Banana flower  preparation  is liked by me very much be it a thoran, sambar, pachadi, raita, vada or usli.  It is quite healthy, tasty and easy to make any thing out of it.   Here i am presenting the Banana flower sambar.  Normally I make the sambar without tamarind.  Yes, you must be wondering how to make sambar without tamarind..  Instead of tamarind, we can add amchur powder, tomato, kokum etc.  but i do not use anything of this frankly speaking but still it is tasty. 
banana flower sambar      banana flower sambar

KASHMIRI PULAO

Kashmiri pulao i tasted when we went to Srinagar around three years back.  Mr. Abdul who was our driver was kind enough to make us eat kashmiri pulao and  drink the famous Kava (a kind of tea they drink),  we liked very much and brought some tea packets which i still  have and enjoy once in a while. shall post the recipe soon.

This pulao is slightly sweet with mild spices, can be prepared easily.  The fried onions and nuts and fruits  adds more taste and flavour to this pulao.  It can be served with  onion, tomato, cucumber raita or lauki yakhni.  Lauki is called Al in Kashmiri and  Yakhni is a curd based sauce.  The lauki roundels are shallow fried and added to the  curd sauce which goes well with this pulao.  No garnish is made in this but for the photo, I have added coriander leaves as I like the same with the raita very much.